Willow-Jean Prime: Labour's Employment Spokesperson on the latest Jobseeker benefit stats

Labour's employment spokesperson believes rising benefit numbers comes down to a weak economy.  

Latest MSD data shows almost 414 thousand people were receiving the main benefit at the end of June – up 1.9% year-on-year. 

12.8% of the working-age population is drawing on the main benefit – up from 12.6% a year ago. 

Willow-Jean Prime told Ryan Bridge the stats reflect a failed government promise to improve the cost of living. 

She says cuts and delayed infrastructure projects have led to a loss of 20 thousand jobs in the construction sector alone. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The number of beneficiaries on jobs seeker went up a

(00:02):
percent over the last quarter. Two hundred and eighteen thousand
people right now are receiving a benefit because they can't
find a job. The target by this government is one
hundred and forty thousand that needs to happen by twenty thirty.
Government reckons eighty six thousand people found work and stop
their benefit in the year to June, up six thousand
on the previous year. However, clearly there have been more

(00:23):
people going on as well. Labor left office with about
one hundred and ninety thousand on this Willow gen Prime
is a Labour's Social Development employment spokesperson Willow Gene.

Speaker 2 (00:32):
Good morning, Good morning, Bryan.

Speaker 1 (00:35):
What do you put that down to the fact that
people more people are going on the benefit?

Speaker 2 (00:40):
I put that down to the failed promise of Christopher
Luxen to improve the cost of living, to fix the economy,
and their promise of reducing doccer beneficiaries down by fifty thousand.
What we have seen international is an increase by almost
more than twenty eight thousand. Moving onto job seeker support

(01:02):
the economy.

Speaker 1 (01:03):
Isn't it like if you don't fix there because you
don't have a good economy, there aren't the jobs people,
then they won't be able to go and get the jobs.

Speaker 2 (01:11):
That's right. And Christopher Luxen, when you're coming into government,
promised that he would fix the economy. But instead what
we've seen is more go onto job seeker benefit and
also unemployment. Our numbers are higher under dis government. We've
seen this government make investment decisions into the wrong things
like tobacco companies and landlords, and the cut and the

(01:34):
laid infrastructure projects which in building and construction led to
a loss of twenty thousand jobs in that sector alone.

Speaker 1 (01:42):
Some of the projects were done, though, what about So
I mean, you've agreed it's the economy. So if labor
was in government, are you saying that we would have
more economic growth than we currently have and therefore there
would be more jobs.

Speaker 2 (01:57):
So labor is committed to a long term investment and infrastructure,
making sure that we are building the road the hospitals
that we need.

Speaker 1 (02:06):
But what I'm asking, because you said it's national's fault,
because if it's nationals and government and we don't have
the economy to support the jobs, so are you saying
if labor was in power right now, we would have
more growth than we are currently experiencing.

Speaker 2 (02:20):
So what we're dealing with is what the government promised
they would deliver and the fact we don't know through
this report.

Speaker 1 (02:27):
You said that, But what I'm asking you is if
we had voted for you, would it be different.

Speaker 2 (02:33):
So if well that, the fact is that that didn't happen,
and we have the government making a promise and then
failing to deliver on their promise. What Labor is saying
coming into this election is that we will do things
like we will expand the apprenticeship boost out to two
years and to more areas in the trades, and that

(02:54):
will create real pathways to employment, to qualifications and wages
for people.

Speaker 1 (03:01):
Do you know what growth was for the March quarter.

Speaker 2 (03:05):
I don't have that figure on me, but what I
know is that the job seeker numbers grew. Do you
know what it was for the last three thousand and three?
So the job seeker numbers grew by three thousand to
March nine thousand, this time last twenty eight thousand under
this government.

Speaker 1 (03:22):
You know what growth was for the year, even I.

Speaker 2 (03:26):
Don't have that for grummy Ryan, do you yeah? I do?

Speaker 1 (03:30):
It was one and a half percent to March, which
is the most recent number we got. Of course, we
don't get Jones until September. But the point is you've
come on here and you've told me that all of
those problems you're outlining about jobs to do with the economy. However,
you don't know how much the economy is growing by
or whether you were doing better.

Speaker 2 (03:46):
You know what I mean? Dis government, which dis government
Ryan promised that they would fix. And what I am
hearing and what I am seeing is that our communities
are in a world of pain. This week we had
in Kataya, for example, one of the two announcing that
it will be closing. I stood with those families. They
are worried about those closures, the loss of jobs, the

(04:08):
impact of that on their families, and the fact that
there aren't more jobs for them to go into. What
they are facing is the real possibility of having to
go to Australia, like record numbers of New Zealand having
to do totally discoveryment.

Speaker 1 (04:22):
Totally agree with you. It's awful and you're right. They
have broken and promise. They said they would get more
people off of the benefit. They haven't. It's gone the
other way.

Speaker 2 (04:30):
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